I am having issues with the Hg peak retention time stability, and wonder if adding a cleaning regime will help stabilize the system.
Article Mercury speciation in seafood samples by LC–ICP-MS with a ra...
Hg is a "sticky" element, it can take a long time to wash out of the plastic tubing in ICP-MS systems. I gather HCl is an important part of the cleaning process but that might affect your LC part of the system.
Have you tried the Plasmachem-L discussion board? There is a huge amount of information in the archives of that group, and you are always welcome to ask a new question.
https://listserv.syr.edu/scripts/wa.exe?A0=PLASMACHEM-L
This sounds ridiculous, but wash with a low ppm solution of gold (say 5-10 ppm). It will complex the Hg and clean out your system, assuming that the hangup is in the ICP-MS side. If you're having column carryover, such as in your injector, then it might be more problematic.
it is an issue with the column, and Au seems to poison the column….thanks for the suggestion, though!
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